U.N. rights boss deplores detention of migrants in Europe

GENEVA (Reuters) - The United Nations human rights boss on Monday decried a "worrying rise" in detention of migrants in so-called "hotspots" in Greece and Italy and urged authorities to find alternatives to confining children while their asylum requests are processed.

"Even unaccompanied children are frequently placed in prison cells or centers ringed with barbed-wire. Detention is never in the best interests of the child – which must take primacy over immigration objectives," Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein said in a speech. "Alternatives to the detention of children must be developed."

Zeid told the U.N. Human Rights Council that he deplored "the widespread anti-migrant rhetoric that we have heard, spanning the length and breadth of the European continent".